


sunglasses

by georgewashingmachine



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: F/F, F/M, Fluff, M/M, Multi, Tooth Rotting Fluff, mermaid au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-02
Updated: 2017-09-02
Packaged: 2018-12-23 03:07:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11980794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/georgewashingmachine/pseuds/georgewashingmachine
Summary: The story of how mermaid Brooke Lohst and human Chloe Valentine start dating.And it all starts with a pair of sunglasses.





	sunglasses

**Author's Note:**

> HI WE NEED MORE PINKBERRY FICS IN THE WORLD SO I WROTE THIS
> 
> also creds to my friends @Tyrannia and @BeMoreChili for helping me write this !!!  
> also christine is heavily based off of @Tyrannia bc they're both ace mom friends and I love them both very dearly

“Chloe! C’mon!”

Chloe. That’s a pretty name.

The girl turns at the voice and shouts back, “Oh, calm down Jake, I’m coming!” before running after him.

However, Brooke didn’t see this, as she was more fixated on the shiny object that had flown from the pretty human’s head. She dove beneath the water and swam towards the shore, searching for the shiny fallen object. She spots it shimmering beneath the afternoon sunlight filtering through the water’s surface.

Brooke stares at it curiously. She had seen these before, but had no idea what humans called them. They were usually worn in front of human’s eyes, or on top of their heads. Chloe had been wearing them on her head, so when she turned to look at Jake they had flown from her head and landed in the water, though she had no idea they were gone.

Brooke picks them up carefully, as if it would hurt her. Gladly, they don’t harm her, and she continues her examination. They were a rosy pinkish-gold color, similar to her own tail and top. Brooke thought they were the prettiest pair of weird seeing circles she had ever seen. 

“Pretty seeing circles for a pretty human…” Brooke mused dreamily, remembering the attractive girl’s sight as she had gleefully watched from afar.

A lightbulb goes off in the mermaid’s head, and, after a few failed attempts and poked eyes, she slides the seeing circles onto her face as a human would. She gasps at the strange new sight. Everything around her was suddenly tinted pink. 

She swims away from the shore, staring in awe at the plants and animals and coral that were normally red or blue or yellow or green or orange that were now altered to appear colored like the rosy color of the seeing circles.

As Brooke approached the kingdom where she and other mermaids lived, she spotted her two friends Jenna Rolan and Christine Canigula just outside the entrance. Christine wore a magenta top and her tail was colored like a gradient that went from dark green to a light green, while Jenna had a purple tail that shimmered with a silvery sheen of glitter and a matching top, along with sparkling gemstones decorating her fingers, wrists, and hair. Christine looked worried, and she appeared to be ranting to Jenna about something. 

“According to my clicky bracelet, it’s been approximately three spins, one half spin, four big ticks, and eight small ticks since Brooke left.” Christine was saying, gesturing wildly as she spoke. “Who knows what could have happened to her since then? She said she was only going to the surface to check out what humans were there today, like she usually does, right? But she’s normally ever only there for maybe four marks. at the maximum. What if—”

“Hey Jenna, hey Christine.”

Christine whirled around at the voice. “Brooke! You’re safe!” She exclaims, enveloping the other mermaid in a tight hug. 

Behind her, Jenna snorts. “I can’t even begin to tell you how worried she got over you.”

“I have a perfectly valid reason to be concerned about Brooke Lohst’s whereabouts!” Christine retorts, “I care about both of you like my own children. I don’t want anything bad to happen to either of you.”

“Speaking of bad,” Jenna looks past Canigula to Brooke. “What’s with the weird seeing circles?”

Both Jenna and Christine stare at Brooke’s newly acquired eyewear, waiting for an answer.

“I found them up at the surface.” 

Jenna swims closer to get a better look. “You did spend an awful lot of time up there today…Surely finding seeing circles can’t take three spins.”

“Three spins? Did I really spend that much time watching Chloe and Jake?” Brooke looks at Christine’s clicky bracelet as if it had accused her of murder.

“Chloe and Jake?” Christine asks warily, beginning to get anxious over what had happened up at the shore.

Brooke can feel herself blushing. “Yeah. They’re the humans I saw up there. Actually, I spent most of my time watching Chloe…”

Jenna snorts again. “You seriously spent three spins watching an attractive human girl?”

Now it’s Jenna’s turn to get an accusatory glance. “I never said she was attractive!”

The other smirks in reply. “It’s kinda obvious.”

“Is it really?” Brooke looks to Christine for her opinion, but instead she gets stressed mom friend.

“You think a human is attractive?” Christine’s eyes widen. “How many times do I have to tell you how dangerous humans are! There are countless—countless!—stories about humans harming mermaids! Polluting our waters, hunting us for our tails—You know what happened to Jeremy!”

“Christine, calm down!” Brooke puts her hands on the uneasy girl’s shoulders, though she can’t help but be a little guilty for finding Chloe cute. “Not all humans are bad.”

Christine pouts, conflicted. “I know!” She whines, “I just really want to keep you safe. Just be careful, okay?”

Brooke smiles. “Of course I will.”

\--

Brooke goes up to the surface the following day to see if Chloe has returned. Brooke lights up when she spots the brunette sitting on the edge a dock that extended from the sand. 

The blonde ducks beneath the water, staring forlornly at the seeing circles in her hands. Brooke knew she should return them, it was the right thing to do, even if she (as well as Jenna—Brooke had just barely managed to retrieve them from her this morning) wanted to keep them.   
And so she swims up to the dock and pops out of the water on the left side of the dock. Chloe sat at the right side, and Brooke didn’t want to just appear and startle her.

“Hello?” 

Chloe turns her head at Brooke’s call. “Yes?” She asks, turning around so it would be easier to see the girl in the water.

“I found these yesterday. You dropped them.” Brooke holds out the seeing circles.

Chloe grins and moves so she’s sitting on the left side of the dock, facing Brooke. “My sunglasses! Thank you.” She takes them and sets them on top her head.

Brooke can’t help herself. “Sunglasses?” Her eyes widen in awe, the new word feeling

Chloe laughs. “Yeah. Sunglasses. Do you not know what sunglasses are?”

“Of course I do, I just—” Brooke struggles to think of some kind of excuse, and ends up giving up. “I-I don’t know what sunglasses are.”

Chloe, much to Brooke’s relief, simply laughs again instead of questioning her. And then she, much not to Brooke’s relief, says “You’re cute.”

Brooke swore she must have heard something wrong. Maybe there was water in her ears. Is that a thing that happens to mermaids? 

“So yeah I just wanted to return your sunglasses.” She manages to smile despite wanting to scream “HOLY HECK SHE CALLED ME CUTE”. And with the sunglasses returned, she turns to leave, but Chloe calls after her.

“Hey, do you want to hang out sometime? We can meet up here tomorrow if you want.”

And without thinking twice, Brooke agreed and grinned and watched as Chloe Valentine stood up, put on her sunglasses, and walked back towards the town that was located just outside the beach.

\--

“WHAT HAVE I DONE?” Brooke yells, bursting through the door of the bedroom where Jenna, Christine, and herself all slept. The other mergirls turn at Brooke’s voice, staring at the blonde quizzically.

“ALSO, SUNGLASSES.” She breathed, out of breath from swimming the distance between when she had realized her mistake and here with such exertion.

Christine and Jenna share a look before returning their gazes to their pink-clad friend. “What?” They ask in unison.

It’s then that Brooke notices that Christine and Jenna weren’t up at the surface with her and therefore had no idea what she was talking about. So, she takes a seat in her clamshell bed and explains how she, a mermaid, had agreed to hang out with Chloe Valentine, a human, tomorrow. And also how seeing circles are called sunglasses by humans.

“What am I supposed to do?” Brooke exclaims in a panic. “It’s not like I can just exchange my voice for a pair of legs like that old mermaid myth. She’s gonna get suspicious when I can’t leave the water, and then she’s gonna think I’m weird and lose interest in me and ditch me for Jake!”

Jenna swims up in front of her and rests her hands on Brooke’s shoulders. “I’m sure you’ve heard all the stories about mermaids falling in love with a human and then getting killed by their lover for whatever reason, so I’ll spare you the details. But all I’m saying is you should probably give it up and forget about Chloe because you’re probably going to get killed and frankly, I don’t want you to die. Or you could end up like Jeremy. Plus, from what I’ve heard she’s in a relationship already. So, yeah, I feel like you should give it up before you’re manipulated or abused or rejected or dead.”

Brooke stares blankly at Jenna before speaking up. “She wouldn’t kill me. Or hurt me.”

Jenna raises an eyebrow, skeptical. “Are you sure about that?”

“I-I just know.”

Before Jenna can respond, Christine intervenes. “We’re only trying to protect you, Brooke. But, Jenna, she does need some actual advice.” She’s silent for a moment, thinking about how to answer. “Don’t stress about it too much. You’ll end up killing yourself over something that won’t even matter in the end. Probably. Just try and enjoy yourself, and if she gets suspicious just play it off. Okay?”

Brooke takes a deep breath, calming herself down. “Okay.”

Christine smiles and gives her a look that says “I love my child, look at her, branching out and talking to a human she likes, I’m so proud.” Jenna also smiles, but it’s less motherly than Christine and more like “Hell yeah, you go get yourself a cute human girlfriend.”

Now that the panic was, for the most part, gone, Brooke couldn’t be more excited for the next day.

\--

Brooke had spent a little more effort on making herself look good that morning. She asked Jenna to borrow some of her jewelry, and for Christine to help with her outfit. All the prep just made her more and more thrilled for the date.

But was it really a date? No, of course not. Jenna had said Chloe was in a relationship. They were just hanging out. 

Before Brooke could delve more into that, though, she realized it was time to leave. So she waved goodbye to Christine and Jenna and made her way out the door and up to the dock. There she finds Chloe waiting for her.

“Am I late?” She asks as she approaches. 

Chloe, thankfully, gives her a reassuring smile in return. “Nope. I actually just arrived, so you’re right on time. Oh! Hold on, I have something for you…”

Brooke tilts her head to the side as Chloe turns around and picks up something behind her. She turns back to Brooke holding two cups of something that looked kind of like ice cream.

“Frozen yogurt!”

“Frozen yogurt?” Brooke stares at the cups in Chloe’s hands like it would hurt her.

“I thought it would be nice to share something with you that I like. It’s kind of like ice cream, if you’ve ever heard of that. But it’s totally better than ice cream. Here, try it.” Chloe holds one cup and grabs the spoon from where it sat in the dessert.

Brooke takes the spoon hesitantly, to which Chloe says “It’s not gonna hurt you. Promise.” That fills Brooke with enough confidence to spoon some frozen yogurt into her mouth.

“So?” Chloe asks, eagerly awaiting Brooke’s reaction.

“This is…” She stares at the cup in her hands, wide-eyed. “Amazing!” And with that she starts shoveling it into her mouth as fast as she can.

“Hey, slow down! You’re gonna get a brain freeze!” Chloe exclaims, though she’s giggling.

“Brain fre—agh!” Brooke drops the cup and the spoon and holds her head.

“I warned you.” Chloe says, smiling at the other. “Plus, it’s better to savor it. But like, not too much, because then it melts. I’ve been practicing and perfecting the balance for years.”

Once her brain freeze subsides, Brooke continues to eat, as well as Chloe, and they talk and talk until the sun goes down. Seeing how much time had passed, Chloe has to leave, and they go their separate ways—Brooke to the ocean, and Chloe to land.

\--

As soon as Brooke swims through the door, she’s bombarded with Jenna demanding to know what went down. “How did it go? Give us the details. I want to hear everything.” 

“She just got back, give her a little time to settle down, Jenna.” Christine scolded.

“No, really it’s fine.” Brooke smiles politely and takes a seat on her bed before turning to Jenna. 

“C’mon! Spill the tea. The suspense is killing me, Brooke.” Jenna prompted, letting herself dramatically drop to the floor as if she had died.

“Alright, alright! Well, I arrived at the dock and she was there waiting for me. But she wasn’t empty handed! She brought frozen yogurt with her, and—”

“Frozen yogurt?”

“Frozen yogurt! It’s like ice cream, kind of. But better in every way possible. Oh my god, it’s so good, you don’t even know!” Brooke gushes, smiling from ear to ear. “She’s like, the most interesting human I’ve ever met. She had so much to say! I could listen to her all night…” She trails off, staring dreamily at the ceiling.

“What else, what else?” Jenna questioned, perking up from where she lay on the floor.

“Oh! And get this, she’s single!” 

A chorus of “ooooh” came from Jenna, sounding not unlike a sixth grader that had learned the latest school gossip. That description wasn’t far off from who she was.

“W-Well, what else am I supposed to say? We just, like, talked about stuff.” Brooke frowns, though from her colored cheeks it appears she’s hiding something. “I guess the only other interesting detail is that we’re doing the same thing tomorrow.”

Jenna pumps a fist in the air. “That’s my girl, scoring herself a second date!” Meanwhile, Christine smiles proudly. Poor, oblivious Brooke had no idea Chloe liked her back, and her two friends that had never even seen her before knew all about Chloe’s feelings. 

“I-I wouldn’t call it a date exactly…” Brooke tries to tell Jenna, but she doesn’t appear to be listening.

“She’s only teasing, dear.” Christine calls from across the room before clapping her hands together. “Alright girls, it’s getting pretty late, we should all head to bed.” And with that, in a few minutes, everyone is sound asleep. Except for Brooke. She was too busy thinking of the date. No, it wasn’t a date. They were just hanging out. Like friends. Yeah, friends. That’s what they were.

Her mind drifted back to an earlier conversation. There was something she hadn’t told Jenna and Christine, though Jenna probably knew she was hiding a detail from them.

“I saw you with this guy the other day.” She had been saying.

“Jake?” Was Chloe’s response.

“Yes, him!” Brooke returned her gaze to the human.

“Well, he is—was—my boyfriend.” 

“Was?” Brooke tilted her head to the side, peering curiously up at the brunette. “What happened?” 

Chloe shrugs. “We just…broke up. Nothing big, y’know? We’re still friends.”

There’s a moment of silence, and Brooke is staring at the water, her brows furrowed and her lips twisted, like she was thinking hard. “I-I’m sorry, was that...ah…rude to ask? Sorry, I-I was just curious, and—“ Brooke was interrupted suddenly, but not by a voice, but rather a pair of lips against her own. She sat there, paralyzed, not entirely sure how to react. Soon enough, maybe too soon, Chloe pulls away, a smile lurking on the corner of her mouth.

“I—you—what—I-I—why did—kiss—is that—what?” Brooke stammered out.

Chloe laughs. “Look at you, you’re blushing.” Of course, Brooke had known that before the statement, as hinted by how hot her face felt, but now she was acutely aware of the red on her normally pale cheeks.

“Why-Why did you…uh-ah-um…k-kiss me?” Brooke manages after taking a moment to compose herself, now significantly calmer than she had been initially.

“Cuz I wanted to, duh.” Chloe responds, as though it was obvious. “And you’re also kind of super adorable.”

At the compliment, Brooke could feel butterfly fish swimming in her stomach. If she hadn’t stopped functioning before, she probably was now.

Chloe’s smile faltered. Brooke was definitely different from all the other guys she had dated. More…emotional, you could say. “Was that too much?”

Brooke snapped back into focus immediately. “Oh, no, no, no, I-I loved it, I just—it was—uh, different? I-I’ve never…kissed anyone before. I-I mean, not like this. This…wow…” 

Chloe swore she could kiss her all over again. “So, um, it’s getting kind of dark…how about we meet here tomorrow? Same time?”

Brooke smiles brightly. “Of course.” 

\--

“She kissed you, didn’t she?”

That wasn’t ideally what Brooke would have liked to wake up to, but she could probably have handled it, but that coupled with Jenna essentially tackling her before she was even awake and aware what was going on had emitted some screaming from the blonde. And Brooke’s screams had woken Christine, who woke up yelling, ended up jumping out of bed so forcefully she had launched herself towards the ceiling where she hit her head, and then very ungracefully swam over to Brooke’s bed and demanded to know what was wrong, and if anybody was hurt, and why there was screaming going on at ten in the morning.

“Nobody’s hurt, don’t worry, I just asked Brooke a question—”

“Yeah, and you TACKLED ME.”

“That too.”

Christine simply sighed and shook her head. “Jenna, please ask Brooke your question without attacking her in her sleep, Brooke, please refrain from screaming.” 

The other girls gave Christine thumbs-up. And, being the tired mother she is, Christine returned to her bed.

“So…” Jenna, sly smile playing on her lips, turns her gaze back to Brooke. “She kissed you right?”

“Jeez, how obvious am I?” Brooke whines, frowning up at her friend. 

“Like…99.9% obvious.”

Brooke sighs and rolls off of her bed, looking up at the giant clicky-bracelet mounted on the wall. She had just about 7 spins until she met with Chloe.

And so, she waited.

\--

“Brooke? Brooke!” Christine opened the door to find the mermaid sitting in the same spot where she had left her. Jenna followed close behind. “Brooke, you’ve been sitting there since nine. You can’t waste your life just waiting for Chloe, dear.” 

“You’ve got to get out of the house, Brooke.” Jenna added. “How about we go visit Jeremy, hm?”

Brooke frowns at that. “I doubt Jeremy of all people would be supportive of my love for a human, not after his experience.”

Jenna winks at her. “Oh, don’t worry, he already knows about that. Plus, I heard he’s got a new love interest. And it’s a human too! His name is Michael. Jer’s like, head over heels for him. It’s cute, really.”

Brooke raises an eyebrow, skeptical. “He crushed on Christine, that failed. Then he met Eric, and that ended in abuse. What makes him so optimistic about this Michael guy?”

“You’ll have to see Jeremy talk about him for yourself. Like Jenna said, it’s adorable to see him so in love!” Christine grins.

Brooke raises her hands in defeat. “Alright, alright, let’s go.” 

Jenna and Christine, triumphant in their efforts to get Brooke out of the house, happily drag her to Jeremy’s place.

\--

It wasn’t very long before Jeremy started talking about Michael.

“So, I heard you found someone? Michael?” Brooke had asked. At the sound of his crush’s name, Jeremy lights up.

“Oh my god, he’s like, the definition of perfect. Where do I start…His hair is so soft you guys, it’s like…really soft? Like inhumanly soft. It’s addicting. Michael’s hair is my drug. And his eyes! God, I could stare at them all day…they’re so nice, you don’t even know…And he’s such a good listener? Oh! And he listens to this stuff, music? It’s like a bunch of nice sounding sounds. It’s so cool! Can you believe he made a playlist about me? Wow, this is hard to explain…uh, you’ll just have to hear it for yourself…Oh, oh, and he plays this stuff called video games? He showed me his Gameboy once. It was super cool. AND HE WEARS HEELIES. You can roll around on SHOES! It’s so cool. I wish I could wear them, but all I have is this dumb tail…He thinks it’s awesome, though. Oh yeah, he knows I’m a mermaid! And he didn’t think it was weird or anything!”

Oh, right. Chloe still didn’t know about that.

“So, what’s Chloe like?”

Brooke felt herself blushing. “W-We’ve only hung out like, once…there really isn’t much to talk about…”

“Speaking of Chloe,” Christine was looking down at her clicky-bracelet. “We should leave if you want to get to your date on time.”

Jeremy tilts his head. “Date?”  
“For the last time, stop calling it a date!” Brooke frowns, though she knew her friends meant well.

“We’re only teasing, dear.” Christine smiles. “Well, it was nice to hear you gush about your boyfriend, Jeremy.”

“He’s not my boyfriend!” Jeremy protested, his face flushing red. 

“Sure he isn’t.” Jenna smirks. “See ya, you dork.”

“Have fun on your date, Brooke!” The boy calls as the group of girls exits. 

“It’s not a date!” Brooke calls behind her, though in the back of her mind she knew that it truly was a date but just hated to admit it.

\--

Brooke and Chloe’s date went just like the first: eating frozen yogurt together at the dock, chatting about whatever subject came to mind, and ending the night with a flustered kiss. Afterwards Brooke would return home and talk about what happened with Jenna and Christine before falling asleep, then waking up and visiting Jeremy before it was time to meet Chloe once again. This routine continued for some time, until Brooke decided they were close enough that she could tell Chloe about the whole mermaid thing. And so, that night, she did.

“So,” Brooke had started, just after finishing her fray. “I, uh…I’ve been meaning to tell you something."

Chloe looks up from her froyo cup, wearing the same sunglasses that had brought them together not long ago. “What is it?”

Brooke takes a deep breath before speaking, like she had been rehearsing what she was going to say. “Chloe, please listen, I’d like to explain, I’ve been meaning to tell you sooner, it’s been gnawing at my brain…”

“Hey, just tell me. You’ve got nothing to be nervous about, just spit it out.”

Brooke looks up at the human, bewildered. “Really?”

“Really.”

The blonde takes another deep breath before lifting her tail from the water. “I’m…a mermaid.” She closed her eyes, waiting for…something. Refusal. Disgust. Loathing.

“I figured you were something of the sort.” Was Chloe’s response.

“You WHAT?” 

Chloe simply laughs at the reaction. “Well, I’ve got something to tell you as well—”

“You-You don’t…hate me or anything? You don’t want to kill me? You don’t want to abuse me cause I’m a freak?” Brooke asks, honestly surprised that Chloe was taking this so well.

“Nah. I think it’s cool. Now…” Chloe takes a deep breath of her own. “We’ve known each other for a while. I would watch you from the shore whenever I was at the beach. “

Brooke interrupts her. “Wait, what? I did the same thing!”

“I’ve had my eye on you for a while, you know. Anyway, I was thinking…do you wanna date me?”

Brooke shakes her head like she can’t believe what’s she’s hearing. “Sorry, what?”

“I said, do you wanna date me? Like, be my girlfriend. And we can be cute together and shit. But if you don’t want to, that’s fine…”

“No, no, no, no, no, no! Of—Of course I want to date you!” Brooke quickly splutters out, smiling dumbly and blushing up at the brunette. “Just…we’re kinda limited and stuff, because like…you’re a human, and I’m a mermaid, and…”

“Don’t worry, babe.” Chloe smirks. “We’ll work it out. Promise. Besides, I knew you’d say yes.” And with that, she connects their lips, and at the same time ending the story of how mermaid Brooke Lohst and human Chloe Valentine became girlfriends.

**Author's Note:**

> a little mermaid term list:  
> seeing circles - sunglasses  
> clicky bracelet - watch  
> giant clicky bracelet - clock  
> twelve marks/spin - hour  
> six marks/half spin - half hour  
> marks - five minutes  
> big ticks - minutes  
> small ticks - seconds
> 
> \--
> 
> some notes:
> 
> \- The Squip is called Eric because the actor that played The Squip in the musical is Eric William Morris!  
> \- He was a human that Jeremy dated at one point that he was abused both emotionally and physically by as mentioned in the fic  
> \- This made Jeremy afraid to date, especially humans, but after finding Michael his perspective on humans changed <3  
> \- Jeremy has a blue tail  
> \- The mermaids can come out of the water, though they have to be careful that they don't dry out  
> \- After the fic, Jake hosts his Halloween party like in canon. That's where he meets Rich and they fall in love  
> \- Rich does set fire to Jake's house and Jake breaks his legs  
> \- After dating Jeremy, The Squip dates Rich and he sets the fire because he doesn't want to deal the abuse anymore  
> \- In summary The Squip is an abusive little bitch and the other ships live happily ever after  
> \- I think that's everything?? wow ok  
> \- BYE


End file.
